Now Is Your Chance to Buy a Slice of Princess Diana’s Wedding Cake
Photos: Getty; Courtesy.
What if I told you that, in mere days, you could be in possession of a 36-year-old fruitcake that helped usher in the marriage of Princess Diana and Prince Charles? You’d have some reasonable questions, like, for example, “What?” Let’s back up. A piece of the former couple’s wedding cake is waiting for your bid right now at Boston’s RR Auction. It comes in a commemorative box.
Another good question might be, “Who buys a 36-year-old fruitcake?” A Florida man who collects all things Diana bought the slice in a box for $1,350 two years ago (the cake was only 34 at the time). Royal wedding cakes actually run a tight little market in the world of auctions. Yahoo reported that Kate Middleton and Prince William’s cake could soon sell for thousands at a charity auction in London, after another piece sold for $4,160 at an auction in Los Angeles in 2014. And that was only a three-year vintage. A cake from Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips’s wedding in November 1973 was “not suitable for consumption,” however.
“Can you eat it?” is still one more excellent question. Yes! There’s a lot of alcohol in the thing, preserving it. But also, look at it. It’s really old. And as the saying goes, you can’t have your commemorative royal wedding cake made especially for Princess Diana and eat it, too. But let’s say you’re not all that interested in the memorabilia aspect of the whole endeavor. Let’s say you’re feeling the entrepreneurial spirit so soon after Labor Day. Then here’s a little idea for you, reader: buy this cake for $1,500 or so, then ask everyone you know if they’ll pay you a dollar to eat it. You’d make $250, considering the average American knows about 600 people and the majority of those will probably refuse to give you money. It’s fine! To be expected, really. Consider a Kickstarter. Pledge to eat the cake on YouTube. Get a pal to tweet it. Hire Mary Berry to film some of her famous catchphrases—“I’ll go for that,” or “Looks scrummy”—to splice in throughout. Go on Ellen or the Today show. Does that not sound like a fun, money-making opportunity? A nice little project to take on as September ushers in fall?
There are non-edible items available in the RR Auction vault, too. A silver locket. A worn silver “D” necklace. A going-out purse. A bunch of stuff that would fit nicely in a growing Princess Diana collection. It seems that 20 years after her death the market for all these bits and baubles, raiments and humdingers, is still massive. This calls for some cake.
This story originally appeared on Vanity Fair.
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